XII 



THE KAVIRONDOS THE NATIVES OF THE KAVIRONDO 



COUNTRY 



THE natives of the Kisumu Province are of great 

 interest. This province was formerly included in the 

 Uganda Protectorate ; it has a total area of nearly 

 22,000 square miles and a population approaching one 

 and a half millions. The Uganda Railway traverses 

 the country between the Man Plateau and Lake 

 Victoria, known as the Kavirondo plains, and it is ex- 

 tremely fertile. The mountains inhabited by the war- 

 like Nandi tribe lies to the north-east, and the natural 

 boundary, known as the Nandi escarpment, sharply 

 divides the Nandi and Kavirondos from each other. 

 The Nandi were very troublesome, but a punitive 

 expedition sent into their country in 1906 has had 

 good consequences and made them peaceable neigh- 

 bours ; it also allowed officers who accompanied the 

 expedition to make some useful ethnographic observa- 

 tions. The Nandi were a perpetual menace to the 

 Kavirondos. This helps to explain the mud, and in 

 some instances, stone walls around Kavirondo villages. 

 On one occasion, during the construction of the Uganda 

 Railway, the surveyors wished to make arrangements 

 for buying up a Kavirondo village that lay in the way 

 of the railway. During the negotiations the Nandi 

 saved the surveyors this trouble by wiping out the 

 village. 



The natives of the Kisumu province are very varied, 

 but those frequently seen along the railway in this part 



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